Friday, February 27, 2015

Circa never
fail to surprise. Just when you thought you have seen every circus trick
imaginable, Circa come up with something new and surprising. Often classic
circus tricks reworked and pushed beyond what you thought possible.

In “Circa
Beyond” a troupe of 7 acrobats, 4 female and 3 male, ( 3 of whom are former
Canberrans), hardly leave the stage for a moment of this 80 minute, high energy,
presentation currentlytouring Australia
after an eight month season in Berlin.

The
performance begins simply with a spot-lit hand beckoning through the main
curtain. The hand is replaced by a leg, then a torso. The torso appears to
struggle with the hand and leg, before the curtains open to reveal a dramatic
black and red setting, on which the women, dressed in snappy black and white
leotards, and the men in white shirts, rolled up chinos and grey waistcoats,
fill the stage with astonishing acrobatics involving flying bodies, flying
chairs, and possibly some animals, to the tune of “New York, New York”. On the
last note of the music the mayhem finishes in a tableau with the whole cast
surprisingly wearing huge rabbit heads.

The following act, performed to the Johnny Mathis version of “A Nightingale Sang in Berkley
Square” involves a rubic cube being passed around among the cast as they
perform complicated lifts, throws, and tumbles until the problem is solved on
the last note of the song.

Each
imaginative segment segues seamlessly into the next, punctuated by ripples of appreciative
applause. Each is choreographed to the split-second and brilliantly performed.
The rabbit heads are woven through the show, as are stylised animalistic
movements and routines involving silks, straps, trapezes and Chinese poles, all
designed to showcase the amazing strength,
extraordinary flexibility and indeed bravery of each performer.

Because the
work is such an ensemble effort it would be unfair to single out a particular
performer. All contribute brilliance equally and their names are Robbie Curtis,
Rowan Heydon-White, Bridie Hooper, Kathryn O’Keefe, Paul O’Keefe, Skip Walker
and Billie Wilson-Coffey.

The overall
effect is surreal, tantalising, and occasionally bizarre. It is also constantly
entertaining, mesmerising and memorable. Those looking for hidden meanings will find
themselves tantalised, while those seeking only to be entertained will not be
disappointed. “Circa Beyond” is a brilliantly packaged demonstration of
extraordinary circus skills.

Sunday, February 22, 2015

Oscar Wilde’s, ‘The Importance Of Being Earnest’, is the
most well-known of his string of comedies written in the 1890s.Judi Crane’s entertaining new production for
Canberra Rep captures the spirit of the play very well.

To be successful, the play needs skilled performers who can
play the intent of a line which often differs from what is actually being
said.For the most part, the performers
in this production get it right.Miles
Thompson is outstanding as the young Algernon Moncrieff.His stylish playing never falters and his
delivery of some of Wilde’s best lines is excellent.Karen Vickery gives a strong performance as
Lady Bracknell.She is formidable, as
expected, but the actress adds an unexpected playfulness to her character which
works extremely well.Kayleigh Brewster
gives a finely mannered performance as Gwendolyn and Jordan Best is almost
unrecognizable in her delightfully funny performance as Miss Prism.The other players give nicely judged
performances, although Michael Miller as the butler, Merriman, overplays to the
point of caricature.

The play requires three settings.Set designer, Michael Sparks, has opted for
simplicity with essentially the same set re-dressed for each scene.His design for the garden scene was the least
successful, looking like another interior room.Costumes by Heather Spong were nicely in period.The women’s hats were well- designed by Helen
Drum but those worn by Karen Vickery had a tendency to shade the actress’s eyes.

Overall, Judi Crane has delivered a fine production of this
now classic play.

Originally published
in Canberra City News digital edition 21 February 2015 and broadcast on Bill
Stephens’ ‘Dress Circle’ program on Artsound FM from 5pm Sunday22 February
2015.

Saturday, February 21, 2015

Suddenly Last Summer by Tennessee Williams. Directed by Kip Williams. Sydney Theatre Company at Sydney Opera House, the Drama Theatre, February 13 - March 21, 2015.

Reviewed by Frank McKone
February 21

The play about whether Catherine needs brain surgery because she ‘babbles’, or is the only one who knows the truth, is one of Tennessee Williams’ enduring works for theatre. In his own time he experimented with staging techniques, famously in The Glass Menagerie where Tom at times removes himself from the action and becomes a narrator, while text signs remind us of people’s misconceptions – such as the hopeful “Blue Roses” for the ill-health condition ‘pleurosis’.

Kip Williams, perhaps channelling his namesake, has taken this production of Suddenly Last Summer far beyond the standard Brechtian distancing approach into the modern world of live video – and has done a brilliant job with his design team, Alice Babidge (Designer), Damien Cooper (Lighting), Stefan Gregory (Composer and Sound) and Shane Johnson (Audio-Visual Consultant).

For many years I have found myself critical of the use of multi-media as it became de rigeur – often being used as an unnecessary adjunct to the drama, merely because it had become the fashion. This production proves that media on stage has grown up at last from its very early days (even back as far as Erwin Piscator’s political theatre in 1920s Germany).

An underlying but crucial theme of Suddenly Last Summer is revealed when the young woman under attack from her aunt, her mother, her brother, her nurse from St Mary’s Psychiatric Hospital, and, she suspects, from the specialist doctor who must decide if she should have a lobotomy, bursts out that she knows she is ‘being watched’. Here’s a theme which, of course, has nowadays become a major political issue called ‘privacy’, and we all feel the threat of ‘surveillance’.

Using live video in this production, everyone on stage is being watched – by us, in exquisite close-up when we need to see exactly how a character is feeling, or to judge a character’s motivation. Combined with a full-stage revolve, we are able to see every nuance throughout the extensive semi-tropical, almost primeval, garden in a way that would normally be impossible in a large conventional proscenium theatre.

In fact, for perhaps the first time in my experience, the far too wide letter-box shape of the Drama Theatre stage has been used to the advantage of the play.

The result is absolutely rivetting. Whatever we might think of the psychological ideas of Tennessee Williams’ era, which this play criticises in any case, the technique used by Kip Williams exposes the awful attitudes and destructive behaviours of Sebastian Venable (Brandon McClelland), his mother Violet Venable (Robyn Nevin), his dead father’s sister Grace Holly (Susan Prior), and his cousins George Holly (also Brandon McClelland) and the central young woman Catherine Holly (Eryn Jean Norvill).

Including Mark Leonard Winter as Dr Cukrowicz (or ‘Sugar’ in translation), Paula Arundell as Sister Felicity and Melita Jurisic as Violet’s servant Miss Foxhill, the whole cast expertly worked in both stage and film method. The only (minor) technical fault was that the good doctor’s mic lead showed above his collar in shots from behind.

If any special praise should be given, beyond the high praise all deserved, it has to be for Eryn Jean Norvill’s tour de force as Catherine. Her performance, and the whole production, should be watched for its clarity of purpose on the part of the Sydney Theatre team and of the author, Tennessee Williams. And, as usual, the STC program is a very worthwhile read in itself.

Kill the Messenger is a great little play, and a different play. It is a modern play. As I left the theatre, I was confronted by the vociferous excitable melee of Friday night revellers bunched around the restaurants in Elizabeth Street, and wondered what world I was in. This was not where I had been for the previous hour and a half.

Great big plays of the past, let’s say by Sophocles or Shakespeare, were set in another time and/or place. For the characters, the story might be personal, but the audience knew that after the emotional engagement, their task was to interpret the author’s intention. What does Oedipus’ tragic unwitting mistake in marrying his mother tell us about the human condition? Are the gods worthy of our continuing belief, or might not we be better off to forget them? How does the ex-king’s son, Hamlet, deal with his uncle’s perfidy? Is the play in 1604 a warning not to continue to rely on the honesty and propriety of the new King of England, James the First (also James the Sixth of Scotland).

We may look back on these plays and see how the ancient Greeks took the first steps which established the scientific method, without the need to believe in gods, and how the next King of England, Charles the First, was killed in 1649, and how the Commonwealth Parliament ran without a king for 11 years, establishing the principle that the Parliament would choose who would be King for evermore.

Nakkiah Lui has set her play in her time and place: St Marys in Western Sydney where her Nanna fell through the white-ant rotten floor of 37 Griffith Street, owned but never maintained by HFA – Housing for Aborigines – despite years of complaints.

Nakkiah Lui (Nanna on screen)

On the screens which are the backdrop we see the photos of Nakkiah’s family, including herself as a child and Nanna, bright, alive, and later near the death caused by the fall. The time is recent: perhaps it was only yesterday when the phone call came from the hospital, or when Paul hanged himself in the park nearby because the Emergency Department had to make him wait while other more urgent lives were saved – or not, as the case may be. Nakkiah did not know Paul but had to write his story. Did she meet him in the park? If she had, could she have changed his story?

Lasarus Ratuere as Paul

The modern play is immediate, in the here and now. Unlike the authors Sophocles and Shakespeare, Nakkiah Lui is on stage. For us, watching, she becomes a character in her own life, frightened even that we, observing from a certain distance, may not appreciate, like, understand her play. Off stage, Sophocles and Shakespeare surely had the same fears. On stage last night, at curtain call, in the centre of the line of actors, Lui’s fear was palpable. This is extreme risk-taking.

Nakkiah Lui

But she needn’t be afraid. She has written a great work, even if not on the grand scale. Our engagement in the emotions of the characters, including the author herself, inevitably embraces us, urging us on to understand her intention. Beyond the question of why are Aboriginal people still treated as beneath rather than of equal standing to others, is the more frightening concern. Is life truly out of our control? Are we kidding ourselves? Like Nakkiah, we write our stories of our lives as if things make sense, as if there is some sort of order in our universe. But at curtain call we must face up to the possibility that we cannot understand the what and why of life.

Shakespeare, perhaps seeing himself in Prospero, came to this point in The Tempest. Lui has proved that she, a Gamilaroi / Torres Strait Islander, stands equal among her playwriting peers.

The performances and direction of this production are exemplary, and must provide Lui with a great sense of support. Each part requires emotional expression of sensitivity and guts, in a structure of short scenes, and each actor – Matthew Backer (the ER nurse Alex), Katie Beckett (Paul’s sister Harley), Sam O’Sullivan (Peter, Nakkiah’s boyfriend and confidant), Lasarus Ratuere (Paul) and Nakkiah Lui as herself – has created an instantly real character. Their work, under Anthea Williams’ precise direction, draws us into a weird experience where the borderline between what might or might not be fiction or fact keeps shifting, like those metaphorical goalposts.

The result is outstanding and should not be missed. But give yourself a little time outside afterwards to adjust.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

It’s important to realise that Nakkiah Lui is writing within a new tradition of Indigenous playwriting, presented on our mainstages. Belvoir and The Balnaves Foundation have been crucial to this development.

Two plays earlier in this tradition are the Noongar story of Yibiyung by Dallas Winmar, 2008 (in association with Malthouse, Melbourne) and Conversations with the Dead by Richard Frankland, 2003, both directed by Wesley Enoch at Belvoir. My reviews of these plays were published in the Canberra Times and can also be found on my personal blog at www.frankmckone2.blogspot.com.au .

The script of Kill the Messenger is also published by Currency Press, 2015.

Nakkiah Lui as Author with Sam O'Sullivan as boyfriend and confidant Peter

Thursday, February 19, 2015

Suddenly Last Summer by Tennessee Williams

Sydney Theatre Company at the Drama Theatre. Sydney Opera House.

February 13 - March 21 2015

Reviewed by Peter Wilkins

Robyn Nevin as Violet Venable in Suddenly Last Summer. Photo by Brett Boardman

At the close of
Kip William’s intriguing production of Tennessee Williams’s harrowing
psychological drama, Suddenly Last Summer,
Doctor Cukrowicz says “ I think that we should consider the fact that she might
be telling the truth.” “she” refers to
Catharine Venables (Eryn Jean Norvill), the institutionalized neice of wealthy
Southern American matriarch, Mrs. Venables (Robyn Nevin), who has engaged
Sucrowitz (Mark Leonard Winter) to assess her neice for a lobotomy to prevent
her from telling lies about her deceased son, poet Sebastian Venables. In
return for his agreement to perform the lobotomy, Sucrowitz would receive a
handsome endowment.

Sucrowitz’s
search for the truth of what occurred during Sebastian’s last summer vacation
with Catharine lies at the very heart of Williams’s tortured quest for the
truth of his own existence. Williams’s writing writhes with the torment of
self-appraisal. His characters disguise truth behind a veneer of prevarication.
Domineering Mrs. Venable contains the unbearable pain of a mother whose
suffocating love for her son has driven him to the deep despair of denial of
his talent and his homosexuality. Catharine suppresses the memory of the truth
of Sebastian’s horrific death. Melita Jurisic’s Miss Foxhill, Mrs Venable’s maid,
grovels in subservient acquiescence. Within the pain of fearful experience
hides the truth of Foxhill’s sad life. Private greed is revealed inthe desperate appeal by Catharine’s mother, Mrs. Holly (Susan Prior) and
brother, George (Brandon McLelland to ensure that Mrs. Venable’s willis in
their favour.) Only Catharine’s ward, Sister Felicity appears truly honest in
her motive to supervise Catharine during her visit to Sebastian’s luxurious
garden, opulently designed by Alice Babidge.

The action of
the play takes place in the luxurious garden of Mrs. Venable’s Southern
estate.Originally titled Garden of Deceit, Williams’s setting for
Suddenly Last Summer within the rich
foliage of the densely grown garden hides the terrible truth that Catharine has
concealed. Motive is cloaked in deceit. Truth is the first casualty of human
behaviour. And it is human behaviour that has prompted director Williams to
offer a radical and ingenious device to reveal the truths that Tennessee Williams
brings to the surface in Suddenly Last
Summer. On a large white wall that traverses the proscenium, the action of
much of the play is projected as the actors are filmed enacting the drama on
the set. A revolve reveals the garden as three cameras follow the action which
continues to be projected upon the revolved screen at the back of the stage.
Film and live theatre provoke a zoom in and out effect on the audience’s
sensibility. Projected close-ups probe the truth behind the character’s
magnified appearance on the screen or within the mind of the chacter, live upon
the stge. In a cast as consummate as the actors upon this stage, it offers a
powerful insight into the truthful effect of the doctor’s treatment and use of
hypnosis to draw out Catharine’s account of the events of the last summer. As the revolve turns to reveal the actors upon
the set, they become diminished by the new reality, insects amongst the leaves
, significantly acting out their insignificant lives. Williams’s dialogue cuts
through the artifice, incisive in its perception of motive, acerbic in its
judgement of hypocrisy. Director Williams’s inventive use of filmic technique
to accentuate character combined with playwright William’s acute observation of
character, drawn from experience, and the outstanding performances of the cast
make this a powerful, riveting and provocative experience for the audience. The
two-act drama has been condensed into one act, played through for ninety
minutes without an interval, heightenting the tension and fully engaging the
audience’s involvement.

Although powerfully
effective in magnifying character and motive and drawing us irrevocably into the
psychology of each character’s words and action, the use of film occasionally
distracts, drawing us from the character to the ingenuity of the technique. At
times, such as during a conversation between the doctor and Catharine, hidden
from view, far stage right against the flyropes, while the discourse is
projected upon the large screen at the back of the stage, Williams
intentionally introduces the split focus of live theatre and film, while still
revealing the live actors far to the right of the stage. It is a rare and very
occasional frustration, almost verging on Brechtian Alienation Effect, as is
the presence upon the stage of the camera operators. Although dressed in black,
their presence creates at times distraction, and might have been more effective
had they adopted the Bunraku device of hooded see-through black material to remove
the distraction of the faces.

Susan Prior as Mrs. Holly, Eryn Jean Norvill as Catharine and Brandon McClelland as George Holly.
Photography by Brett Boardmann

Ultimately, the
true power of this production rests with the quality of its cast. Williams, the
director, has done full justice to Williams, the playwright. Williams is
renowned for his remarkable observation of women. One merely has to think of
Blanche DuBoit in A Streetcar Named
Desire or Amanda Wingfield in The
Glass Menagerie. In Suddenly Last
Summer, Williams has drawn on his mother and sister, who underwent a
lobotomy, encouraged by the mother and resisted by Tennessee Williams’s father.
In Robyn Nevin, director Williams has cast the ideal Australian grand veteran
of the theatre to play the steely, privately tortured, bitter and vindictive
mother, consumed by a personal guilt that a stroke had prevented her from
taking her son on his last summer vacation, as she had done with obsessive,
possessive delight for so many summers before. Nevin is brilliant, never
swaying from a rigidly controlled state of emotion until that final expression
of sheer horrifying realization of the consequences of her domination of her
only son. Nevin’s performance is counterpoised by Norvill’sastounding portrayal of the fragile, confused
and manipulated Catharine. And yet in a moment of flirtatious will with the
doctor, Norvill leaves the audience in no doubt that there is an element of
wilful intent that brings true motive into question. Norvill is a shining star
of the Australian stage, and this performance again attests to her versatility,
emotional depth and striking intelligence in the various roles that she has
played for the Sydney Theatre Company. To see Nevin and Norvill on the same
stage in Tennessee Williams’s outstanding roles for the younger and older woman
is a sheer delight, and one that I would recommend all theatre lovers to
witness.

Kip Williams has
taken risks with his interpretation and use of film and live theatre to explore
Tennessee Williams’s deeply disturbing insights into human behaviour and
attitude. However, one senses that he has never veered from a deep respect for
the playwright and his text, and with a team that have shared the passion and
the insight to bring the rarely
performed Suddenly Last Summer to the
stage in a production that is contemporary, absorbing, dynamic and true. If
there is a ticket left, then I suggest you rush to get one before this season
is sure to sell out.

Who would have expected this very much of its time 1966
musical to be dusted off and given a snazzy new production while respecting the
original material?A huge success with
critics and audiences alike at the Hayes Theatre in Sydney last year, the
production won several Helpmann awards, too.

‘Sweet Charity’, based on Fellini’s 1950s movie, ‘Nights Of
Cabiria’, tells the story of a New York dance hall hostess who is unlucky in
love but forever optimistic.I doubt
there are still dance halls where you can hire a girl just to dance with you,
so the show probably can’t be updated.This production celebrates the morals and manners of people in the 1960s
but gives it a flashy, modern, fast-moving production with a small cast playing
multiple roles.The book by Neil Simon
is very worldly and funny but with a sadness under the surface that is very
real.

Verity Hunt-Ballard as Charity Hope Valentine is a revelation.This is a formidably large role for any
actress and the star of the show has the singing, dancing and acting ability as
well as the charisma to bring it off.Her
soulful interpretation of the song, ‘Where Am I Going?’, is the best version
I’ve ever heard.Whereas both Gwen
Verdon in the stage original andShirley
MacLaine in the movie played the role as a sweet but dim-witted girl, Ms
Hunt-Ballard plays Charity as a woman who is basically intelligent enough but
hasn’t had the education to get anywhere in the world.This gives her performance a reality that is
ultimately quite moving.

Martin Crewes plays three roles – sleazy boyfriend, Charlie,
sophisticated Italian movie star, Vittorio, as well as the nerdy Oscar.He makes each one so different that it’s
amazing to think it’s the same actor.He
sings strongly and with great emotion.Debora Krizak scores as Charity’s best friend, Nickie, and also plays
the smaller role of Ursula, the spoilt girlfriend of the Italian movie star.Her comic timing is excellent as is her
singing and dancing.Everyone in the
cast are working at the top of their game.

The clever set by Owen Phillips with its moveable mirrors
works sensationally well.Some of the
most atmospheric lighting I’ve seen in ages was designed by Ross Graham.Musical direction by Andrew Worboys is superb
and the band plays the score with a heavier rock sound than the original, which
works very well.The sound was a bit
loud on opening night but hopefully that has settled down quickly.

Director, Dean Bryant, has given us an imaginative show that
is totally satisfying.The in-depth
character work is especially notable and the decision to have the cast play
multiple roles makes it more viable in this era of higher running costs.This is arguably the way forward for some of
these older but still worthwhile shows done traditionally with large
casts.Anyway, just go to this and enjoy
it.You’ll have a great time!

Originally broadcast on Artsound FM 92.7 ‘Dress Circle’ showbiz program
with Bill Stephens on Sunday 15 February 2015 from 5pm.

Saturday, February 14, 2015

Director: Dean Byrant
Book by Neil Simon, music by Cy Coleman, lyrics by Dorothy Fields
On at the Canberra Theatre Centre until 22 February

Review by John Lombard

Charity Hope Valentine (Verity Hunt-Ballard) has a gift for getting stuck. If she enters an elevator, it is guaranteed to break down, and at one point she even manages to end up trapped at the top of a ferris wheel. She's also stuck in her job as a New York taxi dancer (essentially a hostess) at a seedy club. Charity has a lot to give but, heartbreakingly, nobody wants what she has to offer.

Verity Hunt-Ballard's performance is phenomenal, giving Charity a wide-eyed innocence, irrepressible vitality and gawky, over-sized gestures. When we first meet Charity, she has just been pulled from the river - her most recent boyfriend has ended their relationship by stealing her purse and pushing her into a lake in Central Park. Charity just wants a man to be devoted to - any man will do - and her tragedy is that the only men she ever gets are ones who want to exploit her.

After an adventure with film star Vittorio Vidal (a suave Martin Crewes) she meets the neurotic and needy Oscar (also Martin Crewes, now significantly less suave ), and as love deepens between them it looks as though she will be able to escape her life and start fresh. But she can't quite bring herself to tell Oscarwhat she does for a living - especially her occassional sideline in prostitution, a revelation that could break the purity-obsessed Oscar.

At times, it can be hard to see what the fuss is about - to modern ears taxi dancing sounds quaint, even genteel. And if she's been with other men, so what? However the lighting design by Ross Graham gives the club scenes an appropriately satanic feeling (red lighting is particularly exuberant) to emphasise that while this is a dancing hall, it is also a brothel. Martin Crewes also develops Oscar's neuroticism to the point where the character seems genuinely disturbed, and the hint that he could become violent significantly increases the tension. (Although Oscar is slightly sinister, the relationship is plausible because she know Charity has a lot of experience looking past men's faults, and anyway Oscar is a step up from the guy who pushed her in the river and took her purse.)

The staging has an indie, "found objects" feel, with chairs and two moving partitions used to create different locations. Costume changes often occur on stage with the live band part of the set (and sometimes worked into the action). Place is created mainly through movement and dance, and this aspect of the show is exceptional. Choreographer Andrew Hallsworth provides spectacular dance numbers that are more impressive because they showcase the skill of the performers without the elaborate trappings common in musical theatre. The focus is on the signing and the dancing, and fortunately both are outstanding.

Two
interesting new contemporary dance programs are being given their first
Canberra performances in the Canberra Theatre Centre Courtyard Studios. Both
push the boundaries of contemporary dance and both are being presented as part
of the Canberra Multicultural Fringe Festival. They are “METASYSTEMS”,
choreographed by James Batchelor, and “Post Phase: The Summit is Blue”, choreographed
by Chloe Chignell and Timothy Walsh.

﻿

James Batchelor in METASYSTEMS

META SYSTEMS

James
Batchelor is rapidly carving out a name for himself as one of Australia’s most
interesting young dance practitioners. His latest work “METASYSTEMS” is receiving its world premiere as part of the
Canberra Multicultural Fringe, and part of the Canberra Museum and Gallery
“Pulse” exhibition. It will also be presented at the Paris Biennale and in the “Australia
in Turkey” Festival in Istanbul later this year.

Inspired by his observations of workers on a
building site, and listing an architect, Anna Tweeddale, among its co-creators,
Batchelor utilises 320 cement bricks and four performers, Emma Batchelor,
Madeline Beckett, Amber McCartney and himself, to create a complex systematic
sculptural construction.

The work is
presented in a bare studio space in harsh white light. The only setting being
two piles of cement bricks arranged neatly at the back of the performance area.
The four performers enter, clad in stylised work gear unified by neat white
sandshoes and beige gardening gloves. They march in unison, the rhythm of their
tramping feet, and the clunking of the bricks as they are constantly stacked
and re-stacked, providing a relentless rhythmic accompaniment.

The
performers are blank-faced through-out, absorbed in the task of arranging and re-arranging
the bricks in precise patterns. From time to time, Batchelor and McCartney
break away to perform dance movements among the patterns. These movements are
deconstructions of movements observed by Batchelor on building sites.

The work
progresses relentlessly until it resolves surprisingly and beautifully in a
tableau with the four performers nestled in foetal position among four
interlocking cement brick sculptures.

“METASYSTEMS”
is an extraordinarily interesting and ultimately beautiful work which will
reward further viewing. It is notable for its originality and complexity, and
as an exciting demonstration of the maturation of Batchelor’s ability to
present complex ideas in accessible dance form.

﻿

Chloe Chignell in POST PHASE

POSTE PHASE
–The Summit is Blue

Chloe
Chignell is a Canberra dancer who is also an emerging choreographer engaged in
exploring abstract themes. Her work, “POST PHASE – The Summit is Blue”,
explores ideas of failure,” using the metaphor of scaling an ice-capped
mountain to explore the changing relationship between beauty and physical
endurance”.

The work is presented
in two parts. The first part, sub-titled “The sublime attends to gravity”,choreographed and danced by Chignell,
commences with the dancer prone on the floor in front of a large pile of
melting ice positioned in front of a suspended clear plastic cloth.

In subdued
lighting, and to a gentle soundscape by Brian Eno, Chignell slowly, very slowly,
moves from the floor and commences to perform a meticulous series of repetitive
dance phrases. These phrases eventually become more urgent and less meticulous
as the dancer tires, until eventually she stops.

The second
section “The endless motion of the motionless man”, choreographed by Timothy
Walsh to a soundscape by Steve Reich, is performed by two dancers, Chignell and
Amber McCartney.This section commences
with both performers in underwear sitting motionless, on either side of the
melting ice. Each clasps a large block of ice to their exposed skin and when
they could bear the cold no longer, they put down the ice, donned tracksuits
and performed a series of jetes in unison, over wooden rods laid out on the
floor. Then, in a movement reminiscent of whirling dervishes, they twirled
until overcome by giddiness, and finally picked up large white sheets to fling around
the stage, before finally succumbing to exhaustion.

According to
the program notes, the purpose of all this was to test the dancer’s limits and
push their endurance to extremes, questioning what is possible. While it no
doubt did this, it also made rather uncomfortable viewing for those audience
members who may have been concerned about the dancer’s welfare.

Common to
both programs were excellent performances by all participants, but particularly
from Amber McCartney who was striking presence in both programs. Both programs
showed evidence of having been meticulously rehearsed with attention to good
production values. Both are recommended to anyone interested in experiencing
new directions in contemporary dance.

This review was published in the digital edition of CITY NEWS on 13th February 2015

About Me

The 26 year-old Canberra Critics’ Circle is the only such group of critics in Australia that runs across all the major art forms, not just performing arts.
The circle changes each year depending on who is writing or broadcasting on the arts in Canberra.
Our aim is to provide a focal point for Canberra reviewers in print and electronic media through discussions and forums. As well, we make awards to ACT region artists (defined as within 100km radius of Canberra) in the latter part of each year.
The CCC has always resisted making awards in “best-of” categories. Arts practice is not a competitive race and Canberra is a small pool where it would be ridiculous to pre-impose categories, apart from major art form genres. The idea is that we, the critics, single out qualities we have noticed -- things which have struck us as important. These could be expressed as abstracts, like impact, originality, creativity, craftsmanship and excellence.
Our year is from September 30 2016 to September 30 2017.
Convener of the Circle is Helen Musa.